The drama of chemistry – supporting student explorations of electronegativity and chemical bonding through creative drama in upper secondary school

Abstract

Getting students to understand the particulate nature of matter is a major challenge for chemistry education. In upper secondary school students commonly struggle to distinguish between intra-and intermolecular bonding and analyse chemical bonding in terms of electronegativity. In this study, we explore how creative drama may be used in chemistry education to facilitate students' explorations of electronegativity and chemical bonding in Swedish upper secondary chemistry education. The study was conducted as a design-based intervention in three cycles in two schools. The interventions (which lasted for 30-60 minutes) were single-lesson-interventions consisting of drama activities and discussions in whole-class and student groups. A qualitative content analysis produced themes that captured the ways in which the students explored electronegativity and chemical bonding and how creative drama enabled collective student agency. The findings indicate that creative drama enabled the students to link the electronegativity and polarity of molecules to formations of molecular grid structures using their own bodies to represent how molecules were organised in different states of matter. The results also indicate that creative drama in chemistry education may enhance student agency in their explorations of electronegativity and the linking of electronegativity to intramolecular and intermolecular bonding.

The research trends and contributions of science education during the COVID‐19 pandemic: A narrative systematic literature review of publications in selected journals

“…Studies in the branch of chemistry and chemistry education at the high school level include: studying atomic structure through a fine‐grained analysis under various conditions (Zarkadis & Papageorgiou, 2020); chemistry learning approaches in soft skills development and research practice (Stammes et al., 2020); games which are positively correlated to the emotions of students in the medium and low categories (Chen, Jamiatul Husnaini, & Chen, 2020); based on the concept map it is known that high school students do not understand the quantum structure of atoms (Ekinci & Şen, 2020); chemical dramas that support the exploration of electronegativity and chemical bonds (Danckwardt‐Lillieström et al., 2020); the principles of green chemistry through pro socio‐scientific context‐based projects that contribute to social and civic responsibility (Koulougliotis et al., 2021); student attitudes toward chemistry, environmental protection and information technology in Hungary (Szalkay et al., 2021); and protocols for assessing competence based on chemical modelling (Shi et al., 2021).…”

An Artistic Approach to Secondary School Students’ Process of Discovering Scientists: Theatre and Science

“…When the results were examined, it was revealed that there was a significant positive difference in the students' attitudes towards the subject of science before and after the theater activities related to scientists. Studies show that when science is integrated with art, attitudes towards science increase positively (Danckwardt-Lillieström et al, 2020;Ong et al, 2020). In other conducted studies, it was concluded that students had an active and intellectual learning experience with interactive role-playing activities in science education and that this situation had a positive effect on students' attitudes towards science (Bennet & Hogharth, 2009;Braund, 2015;Dawson et al, 2009;Mc Gregor, 2012;Odegaard, 2003).…”

A social semiotic lens to capture meaning-making of polymeric concepts during modelling in chemistry education

“…The results show that the drama activity stimulated different transductions and transformations. Processes that, in interaction with different semiotic resources, influenced students' meaning-making and exploration of intermolecular forces in new ways (Danckwardt-Lilliestro ¨m et al, 2018, 2020.…”